Lessons
by countess z
Summary: When the young Billie Lurk first met Daud, isolation had already twisted her into a hateful being. The master assassin saw her potential and devoted countless hours to her training. But when he sends her off on her first real mission, it becomes apparent that she still has a lot to learn.
1. Prologue

**Update: – Thanks to Nika6435, there is now a Russian translation on Ficbook. You can find it under** **/readfic/4519753** **.**

Many thanks to MDGeistMD02 for the title, and for his invaluable help and feedback.

* * *

"With _that_ grip, the only one you'll hurt is yourself. No. Like _this._ This is not the same as the shiv you used to threaten the boys from Bottle Street. Now, strike at me."

"You're unarmed."

"And...?"

"What if I hurt you?"

Daud chuckled darkly at the skinny leaf of a girl in front of him.

"If you manage to do _that_ , I'll be impressed."

He held his arms out in front of him, making himself appear an easy target.

"Don't hold back, Billie Lurk. Strike at me with all of your hatred for the world."

The girl rushed forward with the sword, but just before the blade would have pierced his flesh he vanished. Billie almost fell over from the momentum.  
From behind, Daud easily disabled her by twisting both hands behind her back. He leaned to whisper in her ear.  
"Dead."

With a gloved hand he made a slicing motion across her throat.

In the blink of an eye her arms were free again and Daud was standing right in front of her.

"Again. Try not to die so quickly this time."

Daud smirked as he watched the girl's shocked expression turn to anger. She tried to strike at him again and again, to no avail. This 'training' of his lasted for hours. Morning turned into evening and she was still striking at shadows as he "killed" her hundreds of times over.

Breathless, the girl's penetrating dark eyes stared up at Daud, orange hues of the sunset dimly illuminating the training room through grime-encrusted windows. The room they were in was the former medical wing of the abandoned Dunwall Center for Customs and Immigration, and Billie swore it still smelled vaguely of antiseptic.

The hours seemed to grow longer as Daud continued to taunt her, trying to pick out any weaknesses.

The other Whalers knew not to disturb the training, and so they were truly without any interruptions. Whenever Daud brought in a new recruit, he would devote an entire day to breaking them, forcing them to exert themselves until they passed out from exhaustion. She was already lasting longer than Daud expected her to, though she was clearly in bad shape. The girl panted, her small, overworked body shuddering, yet the fierce determination never faded from her eyes as she gritted her teeth and tried again. When night fell and darkness took the room there was but a minute of down-time as Daud moved about to light the lamps so that they could continue. The girl's stomach rumbled plaintively. She stared with unblinking resentment at Daud's weathered face, illuminated by the dim incandescent lamps. He showed no fatigue and still carried himself as strongly as he did hours ago that morning. Back when she was on the streets, the other kids feared her. Now she felt as powerless as she once did at the hands of her drunk mother.

Billie's hands were blistered and bleeding but she still clutched the sword with anger when Daud's husky voice dominated the room again.

"The minute the others perceive you as weak, they will search for an opportunity to-"

There was a flash of metal.

It had happened nearly as fast as one of Daud's transversals, only this time it was Billie who had moved. And though he had almost immediately used a transversal to move away he removed a rubber glove and placed his bare hand to his face. He was bleeding. The cut was tiny, the width of a hair for he had moved in time before she could cause any real damage, but he had still been grazed by the tip of her sword. He could not find any words to say, partly unnerved he had let his guard down, but mostly astonished at the fact that this sixteen-year-old waif had managed to lay a mark on him. He watched her with new interest. The girl's body began to waver like a tree branch in wind, having used her very last bit of energy in that attack. She dropped the sword and crumpled to the tiled floor like a rag doll.

His footsteps were silent as he slowly walked towards the girl, looking down at her.

"Are you... impressed?" she asked in a hoarse whisper, remembering his words from earlier. Her lips quivered into a smile. Her eyes rested on the Outsider's mark now exposed on his bare hand. Noticing this, Daud replaced his glove.

When he met Billie Lurk just a few days ago she was a cynical, self-destructive girl, her hopeless eyes a cemetery. Now her face shone with pride as she eagerly awaited his approval.

"Yes, Lurk." These words he spoke with a quiet sincerity, but it was immediately back to business as Daud's voice changed to its usual roughness. "Get some rest, but don't sleep in. At the crack of dawn tomorrow morning is when your real training begins."

The girl breathed a sigh of relief and lost consciousness on the grimy training room floor.


	2. Billie's Folly

**A/N:** I do not own Dishonored or any of its characters.

* * *

Daud eventually put Billie Lurk in a whaling suit and nobody knew the difference as she slit the throats of men twice her age and size.

Billie once asked why their base of operations was so far detached from the rest of the city, but Daud said that it gave them two very important advantages: Isolation, and a location so hard to get to that no one would even want to try. Currently they were holed up in an abandoned complex on Peppering Isle, just off the Port District where the sea meets the river. The Dunwall Center for Customs and Immigration closed permanently during the Morley Insurrection, but still kept the cheerful sign facing out to the sea:

 _ **WELCOME to DUNWALL**_

 _ **CITY of VIRTUE**_

And below, in a smaller font:

 _Please have all documentation ready to ease processing time. All applicants will be examined thoroughly for any signs of infectious disease. Please inform an Immigrations Officer if your work papers relate to whaling or whale oil refinement to expedite your entry into our fair city. Thank you for your cooperation!_

When the Navy used it as an outpost for a short while during the Insurrection, they added some other useful features that included a lookout tower and a brig. It fell into disuse not long after and remained abandoned for years until Daud happened upon a secret entrance after navigating a boarded up section of the sewers under the Port District. Fort Virtue, they called it, or simply Virtue, the irony of the sign not lost upon them.

Billie had been at Virtue about four months when Daud finally deemed her ready to accompany him on a "real" mission. This was no docile aristocrat or a drunken vagrant that he would have her practice on. He would put her right in the hornet's nest: the Office of the High Overseer in Holger Square. Woman by the name of Cyn Ludgate had the right connections to have an audience with one of Daud's assassins.

A high-ranking Overseer had taken interest in her young son, Elliot. He was to be sent to Whitecliff tomorrow. And Cyn knew what would happen to the rest of the family when the boy was shipped away.

The mission was simple enough: find a way in, slit a few throats, grab the boy, and drop him off on the boat waiting under the bridge across the canals of Endoria Street. But the reason Daud accepted the woman's plea was not because of the amount of coin offered (which he admitted was substantial) but because she mentioned a name he had heard before. Overseer Hawkins.

About two months ago, when one of his Whalers did not return from a routine reconnaissance mission at Holger Square, he later learned that he had been tortured to death by an Overseer Hawkins. He never found out the nature of the torture nor how one of his men managed to be captured in the first place, but Daud knew all he had to do was wait. Eventually someone with the right amount of coin would find their way to him and give him an excuse to slit Hawkins' throat.

* * *

At dusk, Daud waited on the balcony of a vacant apartment, overlooking the well-kept estates on Clavering Boulevard. Behind him were the slums of the Distillery District; Bottle Street, Gaff Street, and the like. The walls of the luxury apartments and multi-story townhomes were high enough so that the sight of the poor could not offend the wealthy. Daud always knew that Dunwall was a city of two worlds, but if the rich weren't dependent on the seedy underground, he wouldn't be in business.

It didn't take long for Billie to materialize on the ledge, crouching next to him.

"Report."

"They're about to take the Hounds for a walk in the yards. We can go in to the building proper through the kennels. The entrance faces west; no one will be guarding it. There's another entrance through the sewers, but it's not worth them smelling the stink on us. I saw some shacks of interest in the yards, some with bunks inside from what I could see; too many Overseers with dogs for my comfort. Where did she say the boy would be held?"

Their voices were muffled by their vapor masks.

"She didn't know. The bunkhouses hold the boys waiting to be shipped to Whitecliff, but they still might be questioning him about his family. Search their archives and see if you can't find their interrogation logs from two months ago; I need to know what happened to Arlo. Meet you back here in an hour. Do not try to search any other rooms in the headquarters. That is an order. If you sound an alarm or we can't meet here go straight to the warehouse on Bottle Street."

Billie had never fought an Overseer before, and Daud wanted to make certain that she wouldn't be faced with something she couldn't handle.

"Maybe I _am_ too soft on the girl," he muttered to himself as he watched her vanish out of sight.

A window on the second floor of the archives had been left open, and Billie crept unseen into the dimly lit room smelling of old books. The only Overseer on duty was in the middle of a heated debate with a clerk about the interpretation of the Third Stricture, allowing Billie to search the records unhindered. With the help of a thin iron tool, Billie's deft hands easily opened any locked drawers.

Most of the secret files were rather mundane. Billie thumbed through folders with neatly hand-written labels such as " _LOG OF BRANDED TRAITORS_ " and " _SALARY ALLOCATIONS_ " and finally sorted through years of interrogation logs until she found what she was looking for.

 _INTERROGATION LOG_

 _MONTH OF HIGH COLD, 1829_

Billie read past names of supposed heretics until she found a curious entry that had been circled with red ink.

 _ _ **Name:**__ _ _Unknown.__

 _ _ **Age:**__ _ _Unknown.__

 _ _ **Occupation:**__ _ _Assassin. Assumed connection with Daud, which is an offense punishable by death.__

 _ _ **Interrogator:**__ _ _O.S. Hawkins__

 _ _ **Notes:**__ _ _Music box was effective on subject. No useful information extracted. Subject perished within 24 hours. Items confiscated included a pouch of twenty coins and a silver cigarette case with the monogram 'M. B.' confirming Whaler involvement in the recent murder of Marley Bennett.__

Billie put the records back where she found them, disappointed that she did not have any new information for Daud, though she knew he might at least be relieved to know that Arlo did not reveal any sensitive information. Out of the corner of her eye she checked to make certain that the Overseer and the clerk on the lower level were still distracted.

"If you are going to call my wife's embroidery a vain pursuit of restless hands, while you play Nancy with us every night..."

"Are we not permitted to indulge in occasional respite from our tireless duty?"

"It leads to far more sordid gain than embroidery!"

Billie turned to leave when she saw a leather bound book of interest on a desk.

 _"ABDUCTEE MANIFEST"_

Perhaps this would help if Daud were still looking for the boy. She turned to the latest date, reading the names of all of the young boys taken from their homes to be sent to Whitecliff. Sam Thompson. Marcus Finch. Isaac Culpepper. No mention of an Elliot Ludgate. She skimmed the previous few pages. Still no Elliot Ludgate. Billie's heart began to pound. Was this a set-up? The urgency rang in her head like an alarm. She needed to tell Daud, fast. It would be against his orders, but...

 _ _Can't just leave him there like that.__

Billie turned on her heel and leaped out the window, making a dangerous transversal mid-air to a lower ledge.

After a search that seemed to last ages, Billie finally found him in one of the empty bunkhouses, confronted by two Overseers. One of them had a dreaded music box, though it was odd to see an Overseer on patrol with one. His steady hand turned the crank and it continued to play that horrible dissonance. The sound was more grotesque than anything Billie had heard before, and she began to feel violently ill. To her horror, she could no longer perform a transversal.

"We wait for Hawkins now?" she heard one yell over the ear-splitting music, if that screeching could even be called music. Billie's vision blurred but she watched Daud as he still attempted to resist the power. Neither of the Overseers dared to come any closer, knowing that would be their end. It looked to Billie as though Daud were paralyzed by the music, pinned to the wall and unable to move. Running towards the scene she reached into an inside pocket of her coat and threw a canister of choking gas at the Overseers. The cramped room became completely shrouded in the disabling powder. Though her mask made her immune to the choking effects of the gas, her vision was still clouded. A large hand grabbed her arm in the chaos. Definitely wasn't Daud's hand. Someone was holding her with a fierce grip. Billy kicked and thrashed but the one with the music box kept playing and she could not do anything to save herself.

* * *

A single blinding light cast its harsh hue upon the figure in the lone chair of the interrogation room. Billie was strapped in tightly, her head occasionally drooping and snapping back up as she phased in and out of consciousness. It could have been minutes, hours, or days that she had been in that chair, but Billie would not have been able to tell. The one torturing her had gone out for a cigarette and all that was left was one lone Overseer standing guard.

Silence. This moment alone was absolute bliss. Billie closed her eyes, almost falling asleep.

She opened her eyes again when she heard the sound of a body falling to the floor.  
The intruder's footsteps were silent and Billie immediately knew who it was.

A familiar hand rested on her shoulder.

"Told you to go to Bottle Street if something went wrong, kid."  
Daud's voice was even more gruff than usual. Even his breathing was a bit ragged. With a dagger he cut the leather straps binding her arms and legs to the chair. He was in a foul mood, that much was certain. But Billie still tried to justify her disobedience.

"We were set up. There.. is.. no... Elliot... Ludgate"  
She was drenched in sweat, her hair matted to her forehead as she coughed out these words.

"I know that, Billie. Dammit, I know that now. You blatantly disobeyed my orders. I didn't need you to rescue me, kid."

But he noticed that Billie was in no shape to listen to a lecture. He would have to speak to her about this later, though she had almost gotten both of them killed with her mistake.

Truthfully, he suspected it to be a setup from the start, and that was why he had specifically ordered Billie to stay put. He only accepted the job as an excuse to kill Overseer Hawkins, and now he couldn't even do that because of her.

He held out his hand to help the girl to her feet. Billie tried to walk a few steps on trembling legs but Daud caught her before she could fall.

"What did they do to you?"

"I don't know what kind of machine that was, but it felt as if my bones were going to explode. My legs still feel like jelly. They were talking about pulling my teeth next. I didn't tell them anything, if that's what you cared about."

Daud sighed, bending to pick up Billie's gas mask that had been carelessly tossed into a corner by the Overseer.

"If that were all I cared about, I would have left you in that chair."  
Billie smiled weakly, her lips dry and cracked.  
"Take us home, then."

With Billie cradled in his arms, Daud noticed how small her hands were as she gripped his jacket. Daud pushed the thought out of his head. These were small hands that killed. She was as capable an assassin as any of his men, and he still needed to punish her for her disobedience, as he would have with the others. It was all her fault that she had gotten herself in this mess; being "cornered" by two Overseers was actually an opportunity for him to get closer to Hawkins. But if she did not follow his orders he could not guarantee her safety.

* * *

Aside from class disparity and whale oil Dunwall was famous for its efficient sewer system. The tunnels led all the way to Fort Virtue. The darkness was all-consuming but Daud did not even need a free hand to hold a lantern for he knew this labyrinth by heart. Billie was asleep for most of the trip but she could feel Daud struggling to carry her. Daud was out of breath by the time he dropped her off by her quarters and disappeared. Billie was regaining control of her legs and went down to the cistern for some fresh water. She took a basin up to the room and washed her face, her unruly hair. Her bangs were growing too long over the right side of her face again and she took a sharp knife to it. Thick dark clumps of hair were tossed out the window.

Billie felt at ill ease since her return, and though she was not exactly in the habit of apologizing to anyone she felt it would be appropriate to at least speak with him. There was a dusty nameplate on the door reading Captain Albert Lionel, from the Center's brief stint as a Naval Outpost. She knocked lightly on his door. No answer.

Against her better judgment Billie climbed out the window and shimmied across the ledge, pulling herself through the broken window to Daud's quarters.

He was slumped in a corner behind an overturned bookshelf, clutching his side in pain.

Billie was horrified. She had never seen him like this before. Her leader had always appeared strong and fearless. During all of their training sessions he never once showed any weakness, even when Billie felt her body was going to break after the long hours.

"Get lost, kid." came the gruff voice. His face looked unnaturally pale. Billie walked over to him slowly, some apprehension in her steps as though she were approaching a wounded animal that could lash out at any moment.

She knelt in front of him, her hands cautiously hovering over his jacket as if waiting for his permission to remove it. He said nothing, but moved his hand away from his side and she took this as his reluctant assent. She noticed a dark stain of blood seeping through his clothes. Jacket came off and then she cut off his shirt, and Billie saw an angry red wound along his side bleeding profusely. Bite marks all around it.

"Didn't see a hound was loose when I went back through the yard to save you, kid." he muttered. "Took a good bite out of me. Hope the mutt choked on it."

It was clear that Daud had already lost a lot of blood from this wound. Billie had seen this happen before, to some of her old comrades on the streets. If they didn't die from blood loss they would die from infection. She knew Daud was made of stronger stuff than they were, but she didn't want him to die. Not when he still had so much to teach her...

"I'll be right back," said Billie, vanishing out of sight.

She returned a few minutes later with an old sewing kit and a half-full bottle of whiskey.

"No..." said Daud. "I've lived through much worse. Just need to sleep it off. That black-eyed bastard isn't going to let me go that easy."

Billie held the needle with a pair of forceps and sterilized it over a candle flame.

"You saved my life, now I save yours. I hate being in someone's debt. Besides, I just traded my hagfish eggs to Ratface for this bottle. Was saving those, you know."

Daud cursed under his breath. Billie cleaned out his wound with a wet rag and poured some whiskey over it which caused him to wince. She handed the bottle to Daud, who took a long swig.

Billie pierced his flesh for the first time with the needle. She worked slowly and carefully. Daud was very much aware of how easy it would be for her to slit his throat right now if she wanted to.

"You tell any of the others about this-"

"I'm dead. I know."

"You are not to enter my quarters without my permission, either."

"Well, 'scuse me for violating your privacy, master. Would you prefer I let you bleed out?"

Daud answered with silence. He watched the girl with interest. Her skin was the color of dark umber, extremely uncommon in this part of Gristol. It was no wonder that she was on the run from so many; with her exotic look anyone would recognize her from the posters. His eyes fell on her uneven bangs and he chuckled.

"Never thought I'd let a sixteen-year-old girl stitch me up," he remarked.

"Seventeen, now."

"Since when?"

"Day before yesterday. Does it matter?"

"No." Daud took another drink from the bottle. "Where'd a street rat learn to do this, anyway?"

"Remember that time you sent me to Halethorpe's back-alley clinic for some papers? I was stuck behind a bookshelf an hour and watched him."

"How reassuring."

Daud was being sardonic, though still noting to himself the girl was very perceptive indeed, and certainly had no lack of bravery, but such a characteristic often so easily turned into arrogance. He began to cringe again when the needle pierced his flesh. Billie urged him to drink more whiskey. The bottle was almost empty.

His eyes locked onto Billie's and his face became solemn. Her hands stilled a moment and she stared back at him. The dim lighting did not do him any favors and she could see decades of scars branching like tributaries of rivers. He was only in his mid-thirties but had the stare of a seasoned war veteran.

"You can still get out of this, you know."

Billie said nothing. She lowered her eyes and methodically went back to her work.

"I mean it. I'll give you coin to find a ship and get out of here. No, Billie, _ _look at me.__ With your eyes. I'm serious. Go to Caulkenny or even Samara. You're still young. You can disappear easy. In this profession, I'm an old man already. I lost all my chances a long time ago. But you can still slip through the cracks, Billie. Find a corner of the Empire where no one knows your face. Start a new life. You may never have a chance to get away again. You don't want this kind of life. I'm not the person you should admire, kid."

His breath was thick with whiskey, though his words were sincere.

Billie still remained silent, tying the sutures now to the best of her ability. She wet another rag and carefully dabbed at his wound. Her stitches were uneven, but she had gotten the job done and dressed it the best she could with an old bed sheet. Finally, she coaxed Daud's arms back into his dark red jacket and stood up, taking the last swig of whiskey herself. She placed the empty bottle on a decaying shelf which sagged under its weight.

Flee. Run away. It was what she had always done. She ran away from home. She ran away from the City Watch, from the brothel managers who wanted a "dusky" girl to add to their collection, and she even ran away from the damn Grand Serkonan Guard. She didn't want to run away from this life. As much as Virtue stank from the mold and water damage, it was a place she belonged,

The apprentice assassin was almost out the window again when she turned her head to look back at Daud, a shadow of a smile on her face.

"I'm still on your side, old man."


	3. Discipline

The next day Billie was summoned to Daud's quarters. She found him sitting at a desk, writing in his journal. Neither his posture nor his expression gave any indication that he should quite obviously still be in a lot of pain from his injuries. Billie on the other hand still felt sore from the effects of the torture on her body. She stood in the middle of the room and waited. Daud took his time writing in his journal despite being aware of her presence, perhaps to add to the already tense atmosphere in the room. Finally, after what must have been several minutes, Daud closed his book and looked at his protégé.

"Sit down," he commanded, pointing to a chair in front of his desk. Billie blinked at him, still standing awkwardly. Daud tilted his head, inviting her question.

"Aren't you going to... well, punish me?"

Daud examined the girl a moment. The mask was off and he could see her youthful face, her dark skin and choppy, uneven haircut. Brown eyes that had seen too much for someone so young, staring blankly ahead of her.

An iceberg. Solitary. Cold.

She was still uncomfortable showing her face to the other Whalers, paranoid that someone might try to turn her in, but she did not have such reservations with Daud. Her face remained deadpan, but Daud was beginning to catch on to her tells. Now he could see the signs of slight anxiety; the barely noticeable furrow of her brow, the way she kept her hands behind her back so that he would not see them trembling.

"From your experience, discipline has only come in the form of phsyical blows, has it not? Unfortunately for you, I long ago found that method ineffective. Now, sit."

Billie complied, looking up at Daud's grim face as she slowly lowered herself into the wobbling chair.

"Should I take notes?" Billie asked in a wry voice, trying to break some of the tension. Daud only shook his head, his face a carefully composed mask.

"I'm going to ask you a question. A very simple question, because I am eager to know the answer."

Without warning, he slammed his hand on the desk so hard that Billie jumped a little. Yet his face was not twisted with anger, and this perplexed her.

"What in the Outsider's name were you trying to pull back there with the chokedust?"

He never raised his voice, but Billie felt his ire, could still smell the whiskey on his breath when his face was this close to her. She leaned back in her seat, away from him. It was different to see someone this angry at her who wasn't going to try to hurt her.

"Well, sir... I only reckoned you needed a hand. Back before I met you, my old boss praised me a few times when I saved his hide."

Daud inhaled deeply, then exhaled, preparing the same sort of lecture he had given so many of his trainees. He stood now, pacing the room as he spoke.

"Billie. Must I point out your clear lack of faith in me? I am not the boss of some no-name band of urchins on Gaff Street."

Billie scowled at "no-name." The Gaff Street Gaffers were the biggest up-and-coming gang in the Distillery District before they turned on her because of what she referred to as her "exile." They soon fell apart without two of their most clever, and Billie wouldn't have gone back even if they begged her. Not that her new "boss" seemed to care about her fearsome reputation on the streets, but she couldn't help but be a little proud.

She and Deirdre were going to take over the Gaffers one day; it was all they could talk about at night. Their boss, a Tyvian by the name of Vlad was to them a poor leader. His empire was expanding too quickly and he was losing control. A seasoned gangster well into his sixties, the only thing Vlad had going for him was his intimidating appearance. He was out of touch with the mostly teen-aged population of his gang and did not know how to properly allocate his resources. She and Deirdre together at the head, they could have put Slackjaw and his boys out of business if they wanted. That's what they always said.

Deirdre... even thinking about her made the hole in her chest expand. The day she died, everything went dark. The day she died, Billie decided she wasn't ever going to give a shit about anyone else again. The whole damn world was wretched except for Deirdre and she missed her terribly. She would kill every last pompous aristocrat across the Isles if it could only bring her back.

Daud continued, his voice bringing Billie back to the present.  
"I have only one expectation when I give you an order: that you will execute it. Not only did you disregard my specific order to go directly from the archives back to our meeting place, you did something even worse, didn't you?"

He paused, looking at Billie, waiting for her answer.

"I... got myself captured?" she asked with a finger on her chin, trying to determine what exactly he wanted her to say.

Daud shook his head. "Even worse than that. You ruined _my_ plan. Remember what you said to me the other day, when we accepted the job?"

"Said she sounded like a mole. Knew too much about the inner workings of the headquarters."

"Exactly, Lurk. Exactly. I didn't say anything to you at the time, and that is where I am at fault, but sometimes we accept a job from someone not because of the coin, and definitely not because we trust the person, but because it gives us a chance to get closer to an answer that we need."

"The answer being... what happened to Arlo?"

"Correct."

"And... you just wanted to off that creepy bastard?"

"Yes, and I'm sure you also realize now that you ruined that chance of getting him alone."

Billie's memories flashed back to when she was watching Daud cornered by the Overseers. They said something about waiting for Hawkins, but Billie did not know that Daud _wanted_ to be captured. Her eyes widened. It was a good plan. When Hawkins attempted to interrogate her, he ordered everyone out of the room. He kept the music box and played it sometimes to make her sick, but someone as powerful as Daud may have been able to turn the situation to his favor, especially with his tethering ability that she admittedly didn't quite have the hang of just yet.

"See, Lurk, this was what I was telling you about when I said to put more detail in your reports. When we infiltrated the Smythe estate, you wrote in your report that there was a 'large tree' in the courtyard. What you failed to mention was that the leafy branches of this 'large tree' would obscure our view of the master bedroom window and the smoking room window, making a transversal from your specified vantage point impossible. We also were unable to guess from your report that once in these rooms we could move freely without worry that someone from the outside would see us through the window, blocked by this 'large tree' and thus were not able to get the most out of this advantage as it had not been factored into our plan. Even matters that seem trivial may end up being an important variable. When I assess a situation, I consider many different factors. My orders are not merely suggestions, they are part of a carefully constructed plan that will be executed smoothly. The reason why I have remained at the top of Dunwall's underground unchallenged for so many years is that I have a certain way of knowing how things work. When you disobey my orders, I cannot guarantee your safety, or the success of the mission."

Daud sat at his desk again, pulling out a floorplan meticulously copied from the original blueprints of the Immigration Center complex, with a few notes. The lower level of the building was the intake office. The room they were in now, on the third floor, held long forgotten archives, the shelves and files pushed aside to make it a suitable dormitory for the Captain when it had been in use as a naval outpost.

He pointed to a room on the third level.

"What is kept in here?  
"The bunks for the master assassins," she said. There were four of them; Ratface, Pyotr, Simona, and Corin, and Billie was to answer to them as readily as she would to Daud.

"Why do you think I selected this location for their quarters?"

"Closer to you, I suppose."

"Where are your quarters located?"

Billie pointed to a smaller room not far from the master assassin quarters. A temporary lodging, for the trainees. At the moment Billie was the only new recruit and she currently had the room to herself. She liked that quite nicely.

"I keep my trainees close so that I may observe them, and my elite so that they may observe me."

"Wasn't always the room for recruits, though."

Daud raised an eyebrow.  
"Explain."

"There's a bed frame in that room, with a proper mattress on it. When the navy had this place, I imagine it was for some kind of officer or even the first mate. I see the skids brought in that we're supposed to sleep on, but soon as any other recruits are brought in we're going to fight over that bed. See their notes in the old desk, too. Writing's all fancy-like, the kind of script that's hard to read if you never went anywhere past primary school like me. But it's not from the navy, no. They were talking about informants and securing payment. There's holes in the wall from where tactical maps or suchlike were pinned. Lots of empty cigar boxes, too. Expensive cigars, Culleros. The customs stamps are from last year. No way a recruit can afford that; I can hardly afford jellied eels for dinner."

Daud looked away from her a moment, as if making certain that no one was listening.

"His name was Hallam. Died just a few months before you came. Took a bullet to the head. His... own bullet to the head. He wasn't able to kill one of our marks. Some courtesan carrying the bastard child of a duke, or marquis, I forgot which. He just couldn't do it. So I killed her for him. Suppose you could say I murdered him, too, in the end."

Billie scoffed.

"I'd kill anyone you want me to. Even my own mother, if the old bitch hasn't drunk herself to death."

Daud nodded solemnly.

"Then you are in the right line of work."

"Hallam wasn't, though." she declared arrogantly.

"The opposite. He might have been the best I ever trained. I told you that you picked up transversals faster than anyone, but his skills with the blade were on par enough for him to hold his own in a spar with me. He even taught me a few things. Before he met me he had served seven winters in the Royal Guard as part of Emperor Kaldwin's personal detail. Was a precise shot with the wristbow, too. He's killed far more than you have, that's for certain. A quiet one, that Hallam. Quiet and efficient. He was one of the first I trained, and I trusted him enough to make him my second-in-command."  
"Royal Guard? How did you know you could trust him?"

"His wife had an affair with the royal spymaster. When her belly began to swell, Hallam was away on tour, and it would have caused a scandal. The Spymaster, paranoid that she would reveal the affair, fabricated evidence of treason to charge her under, and she was executed. Hallam found me before the guards could take him to prison under similar charges."

"And he offed himself because he couldn't kill a pregnant whore? Sounds like he was soft after all." said Billie with mild disinterest, making figures with a piece of string that she kept in her pocket.

The young girl's lack of empathy might have been chilling to most, but Daud only saw potential in her. She had nothing that connected her to the outside world anymore; all of Dunwall could shrivel up and die for all she cared. He did not say anything for a while, watching her hands with the string forming endless shapes. Had she learned her lesson?

Daud walked to the other end of the room, not facing Billie. She didn't see the flash of a tin nor could she hear the click of the lighter in his deft hands, but she realized he was now holding a lit cigarette.

"We're finished here."

"Wait, I'm off the hook?"

"Not exactly, Lurk."

He took a drag of the cigarette, blowing smoke out the window before turning to look at her. The nervous tells returned to Billie, for the expression on Daud's face was now mordant with a slight touch of sadism.

"Take this key. You're going on a nice trip to the brig, out the front door and straight across the yard. It has recently come to my attention that we are in possession of a very important prisoner. Unfortunately, he suffered damage during transport, and appears to be paralyzed from the neck down. He needs to be fed and watered by hand, and you must also take great care to ensure that his chamber pot is kept clean. We don't want him catching dysentery when we still need him. Above all be gentle. No harm is to come to him without my direct orders."  
"Want me to read him bedtime stories while I'm at it?" Billie grumbled, putting her string away as she stood up.

"No, but he may appreciate a copy of the _Litany on the White Cliff_. I believe you two are already acquainted, are you not?"  
"You mean..."

Billie's dark eyes lit up. Someone had managed to bring Overseer Hawkins here overnight? Her fingers twitched with delight at the prospect of finally getting even. But then she remembered just as quickly as Daud repeated with that same sardonic smirk...

"No harm is to come to him without my direct orders. You can manage _this_ at least, can't you?"

Billie scuffed at the floor with her boot.  
"Yes, sir." she answered quietly. She had only been to the brig once before, and that was when Simona gave her the grand tour. Old Simona knew the history of this place so well that Billie wondered if the olive-skinned Serkonan woman had been "processed" at the Immigration Center long ago. The brig used to be the room where they kept the luggage of those detained, never to be returned to their original owners. Made the hairs on her arms stand up to see the decaying piles of empty suitcases shoved in the corners of the room, to hear their boots squishing on the layers of dirty, wet clothes underneath. No one ever bothered to clean that place out, not even the Navy.

Billie started walking towards the door when Daud began to speak again.

"Careful. He tried to bite Pyotr's hand off when he went down to feed him this morning."

A string of curses nearly escaped Billie's mouth, but she only nodded, staring at her boots in a futile effort to hide her vexation.

"Noted, sir."

Indeed, she had learned many important lessons that day, but the one that stuck with Billie Lurk the most was that she might be able to keep that big room with a bed to herself after all.


End file.
